for Marie
Your name floats, fades.
Not actually you just the you
I see in bits and bytes
Your name, hovering,
bifurcated.
You are in parts.
Crisp sheets, bone white,
scratchy, not tucked
Perhaps a blanket or two, warmed
or cold as a cube.
Halved and whole, you are
twice located.
Neural knitting
reforming re re recursive
searching for the memory the moment the
Mend, then.
Mendicant, hopeful I
pray for you to become whole again
You again
Well.
Sometimes, Yours Truly argues just for the sake of arguing. Because Yours Truly is a bit of a dick that way. It’s not about what she *actually* believes in, perhaps, but she may just want to play both sides against the middle, or she may want to take an extreme point of view just to see how the discussion will go. This can cause Many Problems, actually.
There are some folks with whom I simply won’t discuss certain things, devil’s advocate or otherwise. There are some topics I won’t touch with anyone except those closest to me. I don’t think this is unusual.
Some of the folks I know are the sorts of folks who kind of always have to know the most about whatever it is we’re talking about. Of course, if you know me at all, you will know that I *claim* to be that person ALL THE TIME. And if you know me well, you will know I am usually lying about that. But I’ll still pretend. I like to pretend.
Sometimes, my friends just have to win. That might mean they end the discussion having changed your mind about something. That might mean they have “proved their point” irrefutably. This, I think, isn’t the point of debate. I mean, maybe it is and I’ve really missed something, but it seems to me that the point of debate is for both sides to bring interesting points or facts to the table, and to discuss an issue. It’s not about winning or losing.
I think maybe that’s what I’m really getting at. There are some things at which you can win or lose (a curling match, say), and there are some things at which you cannot win or lose (tic tac toe, social interactions, roleplaying games). We SAY “I win!”, but we are being gooves when we say that. What we mean when we say that is “I have really enjoyed myself. The activity in which we have most recently mutually engaged has caused me great happiness. In the grand order of the universe, I have defeated apathy, which is the bane of civilization. Therefore, I have been victorious in this small battle against the Abyss. Ergo, I have, in some small sense, ‘won’.” But that last bit takes WAY too long to say, and some people cannot properly pronounce ‘abyss’. So we just say “I win!”
My strategy, when I think the discussion has got to a point where one of us is just being a twit, is to be the *greater* twit. This basically means “I am done with this conversation. Let us move on to a new topic, or discontinue discussing anything at all for a great long time.”
I don’t know why this has come to mind today. Possibly because my Da and I were talking about politics this weekend, and that reminded me of another time I was discussing politics with a good friend of mine. And my good friend said some really asinine things, but I didn’t address the asinine things because I knew I wasn’t going to be able to cause my good friend to see the many ways in which she was wrong about basic facts. She had learned something in a certain manner, from a certain perspective, and it wouldn’t have mattered if I told her the entire history of her error (which was basically coined on a bunch of outdated rhetoric that has since been proved to be false information).
And it was obvious that she cared deeply about the issue. So anything I said was just going to cause an emotional reaction. Boy, do I know how that works. Another friend was chatting me up not long ago, and he mentioned his perspective on something about which I care very deeply. He was glib about his perspective, which is quite different from my own, and I instantly got emotional. So I said something ridiculous and excused myself, because even listening to him talk about it would have drawn me in to a discussion which I did not wish to have.
What you need to take away from this post is that I am always right and you must change your mind in such a manner that your opinion matches mine in order for me to respect you and accept you. I think that’s reasonable, don’t you?
Okay, technically, I suppose I can be the only one thinking this, as many of the times I claim not to be, I am. Suss THAT out for a soliloquy, Shakespeare!
Anyway, take a good look at this tyyyyyooooob of toothpaste. Look closely now. There will be a quiz.
What is wrong here?
Really? Can’t see it?
“…for anticavity, antigingivitis, antiplaque, antigravity, antitartar and sensitive teeth”
Believe or not, I’m not going to freak out about the shocking omission of the Oxford comma. ….hhhhnnnngggggnnnn….
Okay, I won’t freak out *much* about that.
I’m grimacing over the idea of something being ‘for’ something ‘anti’.
Would this not have been better as: “whitening fluoride toothpaste that protects against plaque, gingivitis, tartar, and cavities”?
And what IS the difference between plaque and tartar? Plaque causes tartar? Plaque is the Ancient Greek form of the Roman Tartar(us)? It’s all crud that ends up on the little green bib at the dentist’s. Unless the dentist drinks her lunch and forgets the bib. Then it ends up on your shirt. The plaque and/or tartar ends up in your shirt; I don’t know what the dentist does with the bib.
Unless she wore it to the seafood restaurant in which she drank her lunch.
I’m all for being against things, you know. I’m antilotsofstuff. I’m not sure how many Protests there are for antiracism or antiunions. There are certainly protests against racism and against unionisation….
I guess I’m just advocating for anticonvoluted language. Or, one might say, I am in support of plain language. At least in this example.
Whoa. If you dote on me, does that mean I’m your antidote if we quarrel? DUDES. I AM YOUR ANTIDOTE!!
Sometimes, you just have to stop thinking of them as your own flesh and blood and start thinking of them as what they really are – your underage roommates. This is how you will begin to understand where we as parents all go wrong. All of us. We forget what it’s like to have to live with Ben.
Take as an example if you will, my underage roommates’ breakfast, or the remains thereof. WITNESS THE CARNAGE THEY HAVE WROUGHT! (Sensitive readers may want to look away.)
My Underage Roommates have gone through their rooms and have decided to give a bunch of their clothes to charity. This is particularly big-hearted of them. Of course, their big-heartedness has taken over the living room. Have you ever just had the urge to stuff your roommate’s head into the toilet and flush?
…me neither…
There are some great perks to having Underage Roommates, you know. For instance, we now have a home security system:
On the other hand, I didn’t know that ham and bologna sandwiches even existed. Seen here, there is also a side of pepperoni stick. I shudder to think about what the computer room is going to smell like when everyone’s been home from work for a couple of hours. Whoof.
Bologna and ham? Who DOES that? It’s like having a turkey with a chicken and a duck stuffed inside. That’s just ludicrous. I mean, if there were ever a case for a Real Life “I Knew An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly”….what’s that? People actually DO eat turkey with chicken and duck stuffed inside?
Sure they do.
Look, if you’re going to be like that, let’s just change the subject, okay?
My Underage Roommates are also pilots. So I totally go wherever I want on vacation for super cheap.
I have begin my “40 by 40″ challenge. I’ve decided to write (and send by post) 40 letters; one to each of 40 individuals who email me and ask for a letter, before I turn 40 (this won’t happen for SEVERAL years, of course). Some folks have asked me to write about specific things. Some folks have just requested a letter. Either way, I’m quite excited.
I have had penpals over the years…I have always loved writing letters. Lately, I’ve chosen to write postcards. Postcards are a small commitment. With the exception of the postcard stories I sometimes send on the postcards (my recent favourite of those was the one I wrote for my Actor about the barrows), you don’t really get to say a lot on a postcard. Which is kind of the point, I suppose.
So this letter writing is both exciting and intimidating. My letter-writing skills are rusty. I have finished four letters today. I kind of like the pan-Canadian selection here…
It’s like the Monterey Bay Aquarium people knew I was coming. And that the sight of my intoxicating love globes would send the octopus into paroxysms of madness. Lovecraft had nothing on these mounds of madness.
Happy Anemone is happy!
Yes, in fact, I *did* sing the na-na-na-na-na-na-na-na Batman!! Song to these bat rays. They enjoyed it. Nobody sings to them anymore. Not since that unfortunate outing to a Tim Curry musical (it didn’t end well). 
This is the very Bay for which the aquarium is named.
It is a truism that when you go to see penguins, they will attempt to swim through the seven-inch plexiglass to hop into your lap. But only if you’re me.
We call them “jellies” now. Not “jellyfish”. Snurr snurr snurr.
Actually, EVERYTHING just wanted to swim into my lap. Dude here is the size of a queen size bed. Name’s Garry.
Leafy Sea Dragon!
I don’t remember exactly when it was he told me how he felt, but after I knew, I couldn’t stop looking at him. I stole glances whenever I could. He lived further from me than many of my other friends, but I saw him regularly. I could feel him watching me, too, or so I imagined. I thought about what it would be like to kiss him.
Those thoughts filled my days.
Across the room, those times when I would see him, I would stare and stare and blush when his eyes met mine. He would always smile then, and his cheeks would colour too. Most times, I didn’t know what to say to him, so I let him start most of our conversations, although there weren’t nearly enough of them. And I couldn’t fathom the passing of time when he was near. He was all I could see.
He was one of the only people to comfort me in losses, and one of the first to congratulate successes. That was both unexpected and discomfiting, because I didn’t know the proper responses. I never knew what to say, how to hold my arms, where to look. I suppose I didn’t really know who I was when he saw me.
He invited me to his house. It was a warm afternoon, and I went on my own. It took me a while to find it. We watched movies and he made me brunch – fried hashed brown potatoes with green onions and a tall, cold glass of chocolate milk. He told me how much he loved my smile.
I thought I’d never be able to stop smiling.
But at the same time, there was an uneasiness in the pit of my stomach. There was a shuddering in my mind’s eye. Why is he really saying this? What am I supposed to say? Should I compliment him? Should I thank him? How can I change the subject?
I needn’t have worried.
“Do you want to know what I heard on the news?” He asked.
“Yes, I do.”
“I heard there was this man in New York or Chicago or something, and he was a frequent flyer, and so one day, he tried to get on the plane with his pickle wrapped in aluminum foil.”
I stared at him, and watched his eyes sparkle as he laughed.
“Can you imagine having to explain that to the people at the metal detectors?”
I sat back and thought about it. I could, indeed, imagine that. But where would he keep the pickle? I wondered. “I would totally do that,” I heard myself saying.
He stopped laughing. “What?” He asked incredulously.
“I would do that. I would totally wrap my pickle in foil and try to get through the metal detectors.”
He was staring at me, and he had the strangest look on his face. It was the sort of look that said ‘I am confused’. “But cenobyte,” he said tenderly, his voice full of concern. “You’re a girl.”
It was my turn to stare. “Yes,” I agreed. “I am.”
We stared at one another over cooling plates of hashbrowns. “…do you mean…” he began slowly, deliberately. “That is something…you would do…if…”
“If I had a pickle at the airport. Yes, yes.” I was impatient with him.
Something was wrong. He kept glancing at me sidelong.
It wasn’t until I went home later that afternoon that I realised he had used the word pickle synonymously with penis. This was an idiom I had not previously encountered. The entire conversation of that morning unfurled in the nascent folds of my memory.
I wondered if my preteen self ought to pick up the phone and explain to my first serious boyfriend that I thought he’d meant some fellow had wrapped an actual *pickle* in foil, and that I had thought that would be a ridiculous amount of fun to not be willing to explain to airport security, and that I’d had no idea that he actually meant that the fellow had wrapped his own johnson in foil, but then I thought better of calling him to explain all of this to him, not because I didn’t want to admit that I’d been confused, but because it was more than a little embarassing to not catch on to an entire conversation for HOURS. I never did explain it to him. I did, however, wonder why anyone would wrap their wang in foil at an airport.
But then I thought about how much fun it really would be to take various random objects wrapped in foil through security and figured that the fellow who’d done it couldn’t really be that dissimilar from me in the end. Not *really*.
Little did I know that that conversation would be one of the cornerstones for my reputation for years to come.
People always ask me, “what do you believe in?”
Actually, they don’t. Not always.
Sometimes, people ask me, “what do you believe in?”
Or, if they’re persnickety about dangling participles, they might ask me, “In what do you believe?”
I believe in karma.
